Rev. Matthew Versemann

                                                                                      St. John Lutheran Church

                                                                                      Waverly, Iowa

                                                                                      2nd Sunday @ Pentecost

                                                                                      January 16th, 2011

 

“Behold! The Lamb Of God!”

 

God’s PEACE is ALWAYS YOURS in Jesus!

 

Here the Word of God from John 1, “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.”

 

 

DEAR FRIENDS IN CHRIST,


Don’t look at John. He’s not much to look at anyway: unshaven, desert nomad, camels’ clothing, and honey-coated locust remain sticking in his beard. Follow his bony, pointer finger. and look where he is pointing. ‘Behold,’ John says. See for yourself. John wants to draw your attention away from himself. “I must decrease; Jesus must increase.” John wants the world to know, “It’s not about me! It’s all about Him.”  John came baptizing with water in preparation, so that Jesus might

be revealed. We heard about that last week at Jesus’ baptism - the heavens opened, the Spirit descended, the voice of the Father. Now John testifies, ‘Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.’

In all honesty, we don’t know what Jesus looked like. We haven’t discovered any  pictures that date back to Jesus’ life on earth. We don’t even have a description. He probably looked like any other Israelite. Isaiah says, “No beauty was found in Him, that we should desire Him.” Not a celebrity, not one of the beautiful A-list people you see on television. An ordinary carpenter from Nazareth. And yet, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

“Lamb” meant sacrifice. That’s what lambs were good for. Their throats were slit, their blood poured out on the altar. Their bodies roasted in the fire, sometimes consumed completely, other times shared in communion. The lamb was your substitute, your vicarious victim, the sacrifice to satisfy God’s anger against you.

 

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Before Jesus was born and died, you brought your lamb to the temple, or purchased one from the shepherd’s who worked in the fields of Bethlehem.  Then you laid your hands on the animal’s head, while confessing your sins to the priest, and before the Altar. You looked that lamb in the eye, and that lamb looked you in the eye - Life for life. The soul that sins shall die. Yet, the lamb died in your place. The lamb didn’t know what was about to happen to it. Jesus did know!

Remember Isaac, the son of Abraham, the son of the promise, walking up Mount Moriah with his father, carrying the wood, and the knife, and the fire. “Where is the lamb for the burnt offering,” little Isaac asked. “The Lord will provide,” Abraham answered.  And we’re told, “Abraham believed,” even as he tied his one and only son to the altar, and raised his knife to kill him, as God had commanded. And then a voice - the voice of Christ - calling out to Abraham. “Abraham, Abraham. Do not lay a hand on the boy.” Suddenly, Abraham saw a male lamb - a ram - caught in the thicket, by its horns - Life for life. God provided the lamb, and Isaac lives!

Remember Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, when Israel’s sins were atoned with blood. There were two goats. One let loose in the wilderness, bearing the sins of the people – that one was the ‘scape goat’. The other one was sacrificed, it’s blood poured out on the cover of the ark of the covenant to satisfy God’s wrath. The Lord said in Leviticus 17, “The life of the creature is in its blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life”.

Every day in Israel a lamb was killed - one in the morning, one in the evening – because God’s people sin every day. God told the priests to offer these sacrifices for the peoples’ sins. Whenever you sinned in the OT, God’s Word said, “Kill another Lamb.” The reason Jesus is stepping onto the scene is because the blood of sheep and goats can’t really forgive sins. Only Christ’s blood can. “Behold! The lamb of God, Who takes away the sin of the world.”

You may say: “It seems so crude, so primitive, so “uncivilized”, all this bloodshed, this “cruelty” to innocent animals, this unwarranted, horrible death. How awful!” We shudder at the thought of millions of lambs shedding their blood and dying, to forgive sinners, while we sit in our comfortable pews in beautiful churches.  You might be tempted to say, “Thank God that we live in the New Testament, and don’t have to deal with all this blood!”  Right? Wrong! You couldn’t be more wrong, if you believe that.

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You need ‘blood sacrifice’ every bit as much as those Old Testament people, in order to be saved. The Bible tells us what the payment for sin is: “Life for life…..

Blood for blood.” In our sinful smugness, we might think that we’re ‘above’ such grotesque stuff. Be careful, you’re on the borderline of idolatry. Don’t tell God what He must or must not do, to forgive you. Let Him tell you what He has done to forgive you. And what He’s done is: “Life for life….Blood for blood.” God’s Word makes painfully clear:  “Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness.”

 

So who’s blood will it be – yours or the Lamb’s? We try to atone for our own sins, don’t we? That’s the Performance Plan!  We offer up our guilt, hoping that God will see how bad we feel. We’ll sacrifice ourselves or our children to try and get God to see how good we are. We’ll offer up our marriages, our sobriety, our sanity, trying to get God to love us. The truth is:  He never stopped.  Teens may cut them-selves, to show how sorry or guilty they are; but our blood brings no peace. We offer up the unborn on the altar of abortion, but the stain of sin isn’t removed.

The Bible says ‘Life for life….blood for blood.’ But your blood and mine won’t do. It’s tainted blood. I John 1, ‘The blood of Jesus, God’s Son, cleanses us from all sin.” I Peter 1, “You were redeemed, not with gold or silver, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.” Colossians 1, God was pleased to reconcile all things to Himself, by making peace through Christ’s blood, shed on the cross.”  This is the heart of our faith. This is the core of Christianity. Since Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, He’s sinless – so He’s qualified to die as a substitute. Since you can’t nail a spirit to a cross, Jesus becomes true man, He takes on flesh and blood, so He’s qualified to bleed and die. Because He’s infinite God, He’s qualified to bleed and die for all people. And when He was baptized in the Jordan River, as we saw last week, He had all of your sins washed onto Him.

He became the idolator - though He feared, loved, and trusted God above all things. He became the blasphemer, though He never misused God’s name once. He became the Sabbath breaker, though He never despised preaching and God’s Word. He was the Prodigal Son, though He always obeyed His parents, always did what was pleasing to His heavenly Father, and rendered unto Caesar that which was Caesar’s. He became the murderer, though He never laid His hands on anyone, except to bless them, heal them, or give them life. He became the adulterer, even though He never lusted in His heart. He became the thief, even though the only thing He ever came to steal was your heart. He became the liar, though He spoke the truth with every breath. He became the restless coveter, though He was content to live by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Page  3
He became your sin, bearing it like a Lamb, bleeding and dying with it laid on Him, as your Substitute. Only Jesus did that, and no one else. There brilliant thinkers, great religious leaders, and people who are ‘the salt of the earth’; but they’ve all got tainted blood. None of them have the qualifications to save us:  sinless, true man, and true God. Jesus does! “Behold the Lamb of God, Who takes away the sin of the world.”

Notice: He’s not just for you, He’s for the world. Jesus didn’t come to redeem the redeemable. There were none!  He didn’t come to save the salvageable. There weren’t any.  He didn’t come to “help those who help themselves”. That’s the Performance Plan lie the devil wants you to believe. NO! Jesus came to help the helpless, to love the loveless, to forgive the guilty, “Life for Life…Blood for blood’ He’s God’s Lamb for the world. He’s the Savior of everyone, whether they know it or not; but if they don’t know it, they’ll go to hell in their sin and ignorance, with all of their sins having been paid for.  That’s why God sent John to point out Jesus, “Behold! The Lamb of God, Who takes away the sin of the world.”

You are the ‘John the Baptizers’ for such a time as this! We’ve had ‘about’ 45-50 of our members take our Adult Confirmation Class, and they’ve brought others to the class with them, in order to help their friend or family member attend. But many of you are still sitting on the sidelines. This is how the church grows. Part of your Christian calling is to be a Pointer or a Finger, like John the Baptist!  The whole burnt offering, that covers the world’s sins - all of its idolatries and adulteries, its homicides and genocides, its terrorism and fanaticism, its inhumanity and suffering – the whole burnt offering has been sacrificed.  God’s Son has already died to save the world. And baptized into Jesus, you are united with Christ in His death OVER YOUR SINS. You are united with Jesus in His life OVER YOUR DEATH.

 

Now what? John said, “Behold! The Lamb of God, Who takes away your sins.” Andrew heard John and he went to Simon and said, “We found the Messiah,” or more accurately, “the Messiah has found us”. Andrew and Simon went to Philip and said, “Come and See.” Philip went to Nathaniel and said, “We have found the One Moses wrote about – of Whom the prophets spoke- Jesus of Naraeth.” Jesus sent the 12 and said, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I told you.”

 

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Christian tradition tells us that those 12 disciples, with no computers, no cell phones, no transportation like we have today, they divided the world up into 12 pieces, like 12 slices of pie; and they charged one another with the great task of taking this Good News to their ‘chunk’ of the world. And they did. We know from history, Peter took the Gospel as far as Rome, where he was later crucified. Paul took the Gospel as far as Spain, before being brought back to Rome to be beheaded. Thomas – yes doubting Thomas, saw the Risen Jesus – and took the Gospel all the way to India, where there are still Christian today, who claim Thomas as the founder of their church – before Thomas was stabbed to death. John took the Gospel to Asia Minor, and on and on.

 

You see when you look a lamb straight in the eyes, and confess your sins; and that Lamb looks you straight in the eyes, and sheds His blood for you! It changes you! You’re not the same anymore. God ‘cut a deal’ with Himself in eternity to send Jesus as a Lamb to pay for your sins. God has appeased Himself. God has satisfied His own anger against you. God introduced the death of a substitute so that man could be redeemed.  So laugh you sinners – laugh with Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, John the Baptist - and all believers of all time: 

 

What Abraham was asked to do, God’s Done!

He’s offered up His only Son!

 

Amen!

 

And now may the peace of God, which passes all human understanding, keep our hearts and minds in the one true faith, unto life everlasting. AMEN!


In the name of Jesus,
Amen